FLORIDA, UNITED STATES
"My work explores the anxiety of being inside a body. Everything that comprises our identity is only a small part of a microcosm of systems that operate without our knowledge or consent. We are trapped in a failing machine that can turn against itself at any moment. I approach this disconnect through an emotional lens rather than from a scientific one.
I directly confront this anxiety through constant engagement with the figure and the creation of shifting characters. They aren’t quite human, but not quite alien either. They can shape their own flesh however they see fit. Once created, they take on a life of their own and act on their own desires.
These characters are forced to find ways to pass for a kind of social acceptability. They are in constant struggle with their flesh, which acts on its own desires. This struggle begins to take a toll, constantly threatening to break their veneer of civility.
My subjects are tourists in an unfamiliar and unnatural world, badly imitating what they see. They don’t understand conventional language and have little hope of grasping our customs. Signifiers are contorted to become superficial dressings which interrogate what may lie within. As they attempt to maintain social acceptability, they perform gender.
Some of my figures are better suited to disguise than others. Some reject the concept of passing altogether and instead fashion themselves into something that has no basis in reality. They may drop out and create their own culture, built from appropriated and recontextualized scraps of their surroundings. Though they are all struck with the question of culture, none of my figures respond to it in the same way."